ABSTRACT
In the socialist theory of Fourier the root cause of social problems was the alleged poor fit between human nature and the demands of capitalism. An important variant of the natural rights socialism was offered in the anarchist philosophy of Pierre Joseph Proudhon, who would later quarrel with Karl Marx over the leadership of the socialist movement. The socialist theories sketched provide but a sample of the different socialisms offered up in the nineteenth century. Christian socialism offered a somewhat different view of human nature. Louis Blanc, a socialist member of the provisional government, had attempted to meet the needs of the unemployed workers of Paris by instituting a system of national workshops, which provided public employment for the unemployed. In the Manifesto of the Communist Party, which appeared in 1848, Marx and Frederick Engels offered yet another version of socialism to nineteenth-century readers.
